Posted on 05/06/2005 10:01:33 AM PDT by quidnunc
Politics is all local, especially at election time. But the "Little Britain" manner in which Tony Blair's enemies have exploited Iraq before today's election is a real disgrace.
In their extreme zeal to try and prove that "Blair lied," his critics amongst the Conservative Party and the Liberal Democrats — and all the left-of-center, fashionable bien-pensant writers, actors and intellectuals of London — resolutely turn their face against the realities of Iraq and of the Middle East itself. Listening to the tone of the debate, you would think that there were no Iraqis out there and that "Iraq" was merely a code word for some appalling new kind of politically incorrect abuse. You would think that George Bush and Mr. Blair invented the threat from Saddam.
-snip-
Anyone who pretends — as many of Mr. Blair's opponents do — that Saddam could have been controlled by the principled resilience of the Security Council in 2003, is deliberately ignoring history. Moreover, the sanctions which contained Saddam — and indeed, also profited him — had devastated Iraq's people. Opponents of Western policy toward Iraq used to emphasize that before March 2003. Now they never mention it.
-snip-
I can think of many, many reasons to vote against Mr. Blair's New Labour party today. But it is really depressing that his role in liberating Iraq (and previously Sierra Leone, Kosovo and Afghanistan) is just the subject of vulgar abuse by Little Englanders. To them anti-Americanism is far more important than solidarity with Iraqis trying to build a new society.
-snip-
He took a big step, but he was misguided making deals with the Devil (Sinn Fein/IRA)!!
They did, fair play!!
When you spank the UK posters who cause trouble (ie. posting under many different names) then many will side with you. Yet, as long as the " UK tribe of rule breakers" continue they should receive no quarter!
BTW I enjoy yours and Ivan's posts.
“Now please read post #20 on this thread, in it there is a quote where quidnunc clearly states that he was on a personal crusade against British posters here on FR, due entirely to his preconceived anti-British bias.”
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First as I have repeated several times, motivation is none of your business. The articles are. Nevertheless addressing you obsession with his reasons, as I read it quidnunc said he was tired of Brit Bush bashing and would make it his business to expose this trait. And he has done so. On FR that strikes me as a perfectly legitimate motivation. Any other reading of his post, or ludicrous speculation which I have read on FR (ie: a British woman dumped him) as to his ‘real’ motives is a distortion of what he said and none of your business.
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“Firstly, I despise the BBC and would like to see them disbanded. Secondly, there are also plenty of leftist news sources in the USA attacking the Bush administration, so you should hardly be surprised that the leftist media in European countries is also attacking it.”
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I am glad to hear that you personally “despise the BBC.” However your anti-Americanism was never questioned. Unlike the personal attacks you have directed at quid, he posted articles which referred to the British public not you. As I suggested earlier, to the extent that you disagree with anti-Americanism in the UK, I am very glad that you make your opinions known.
As to the comparison of the BBC to US left media, the BBC is not the same on several fronts. The BBC is a state funded media and the main source of broadcast news in UK. It is not in general on the left so its anti-US position can not be explained that way. I explain it as being very Arabist. Also, the BBC is shown internationally which makes its impact quite serious.
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“The Conservative Party did sell out the US." dervish
"No it didn't." David Hunter
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“In February 2004, Howard called on Tony Blair to resign over the Iraq war, because he had failed to ask "basic questions" regarding WMD claims and misleading the Parliament. (*) In July the Tory leader stated that he would not have voted for the motion that authorised the Iraq war had he known the quality of intelligence information which the WMD claims were based on. At the same time, he said he still believed in the Iraq invasion was right because "the prize of a stable Iraq was worth striving for". (*) His criticism of Blair did not earn Howard sympathies in Washington, where President Bush refused to meet him; Karl Rove is reported to have told Howard: "You can forget about meeting the president full stop. Don't bother coming."
http://www.absoluteastronomy.com/encyclopedia/M/Mi/Michael_Howard.htm
So do you disagree with this account?
“Michael Howard deepened his feud with the White House yesterday when he pointedly refused to offer the traditional post-election congratulations to George Bush.
Angered by a White House edict banning him from meeting the president - as punishment for criticising Tony Blair over Iraq - Mr Howard said it would be wrong for him to express any view on the poll.
In an interview with the Sunday Telegraph the arch-Atlanticist was asked whether he was pleased that a fellow rightwinger had beaten a liberal. He said: "I made it clear that I could work perfectly well with both President Bush and President Kerry ... I don't think it's appropriate to express a view on those elections."
Mr Howard's remarks may appear bland. But in the language of diplomacy they amount to a rebuke to Mr Bush - and in particular to his polling guru, Karl Rove, who told him he would not be welcome at the White House after he criticised Mr Blair's use of intelligence before the Iraq war.
Mr Rove was reported by the Sun as telling Howard aides: "You can forget about him meeting the president. Don't bother coming."
In his interview Mr Howard hit back at Mr Rove, who is widely credited with masterminding President Bush's decisive victory. Criticising the White House for being "very protective" of Mr Blair, he added: "I am not going to be told by anyone how to do my job and if it displeases those in the White House, that's tough."
Mr Howard's decision to distance himself from the White House reflects his belief that Mr Bush is so unpopular in Britain that voters will be impressed by a politician who stands up to him. This has created a unprecedented situation in which a Labour prime minister will be feted at the White House while a Tory leader is cold-shouldered.”
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/conservatives/story/0,9061,1345806,00.html
And that one?
Yeah, we walked it. The Scousers cheated us out of the Champions League though!
Let's get this straight -
1. You again think it's perfectly OK for someone with a proven vendetta to slime America's principal ally. You really think it's OK for someone to perpetrate smears? Fortunately, I can say, that apparently the owners of this site do not agree with your perspective.
2. I posted what Michael Howard actually said - not the Guardian's interpretation of what he said. You actually trust what the left-wing Guardian (which has its own agenda) says over the complete words from the horses' mouth?
This is so totally barmy, I am at a loss as to how to tell you how ridiculous it is. I have answered your allegations, I've posted facts - it is simply not my fault that you will go to any apparent length to ignore them. It is precisely this kind of irrational behaviour to which David and I have objected, and which you insist on persisting in.
Ivan
I feel sorry for David Trimble. He sincerely thought he was doing the right thing in taking risks for peace...however he was betrayed and swindled by Sinn Fein / IRA. He just paid the ultimate political price for doing so. He deserves a nice book deal for his memoirs, a seat in the House of Lords and a peaceful retirement...his epitaph will be, "He did his best".
Regards, Ivan
JJ, could you explain to a Yank such as myself why Chelsea has historically been a Tory area? We in the states know of it only because of the punk scene.
I have no idea. People who live there tend to have a lot of money. I suppose that has something to do with it.
Actually, he did not focus on Bush bashing, he also said: 'our country, our culture and pretty much all things American in general.' In other words, while he was on a British forum he had been flamed by some anti-American toerags and he had taken it to heart. Now I have been on this forum for over 3 years and I have been flamed by many anglophobes and Brit bashers and been called "limey" more times than I can remember, however, I have not gone to a British forum and spent my time encouraging anti-American sentiment - but quidnunc did the equivalent of that.
However your anti-Americanism was never questioned.
Are you accusing me of being anti-American?
As to the comparison of the BBC to US left media, the BBC is not the same on several fronts. The BBC is a state funded media and the main source of broadcast news in UK. It is not in general on the left so its anti-US position can not be explained that way. I explain it as being very Arabist.
The BBC are leftist, people in Britain understand this, BBC reporting is almost always biased against the Torie party.
His criticism of Blair did not earn Howard sympathies in Washington, where President Bush refused to meet him; Karl Rove is reported to have told Howard: "You can forget about meeting the president full stop. Don't bother coming."
Criticising the White House for being "very protective" of Mr Blair, he added: "I am not going to be told by anyone how to do my job and if it displeases those in the White House, that's tough."
Obviously, Bush and Rove were angry that Howard had attacked Blair about the way he justified the Iraq war and they wanted to punish him. When this disagreement became public, Howard could hardly have capitulated because that would be tantamount to allowing a foreign government to dictate policy to Britain's official opposition party. Even if all this had transpired the way we are led to believe it did, then it hardly means that the Conservative party sold out the US. Especially when you consider that Howard mantained all the way through the general election campaign that if he had been prime minister he would have invaded Iraq because he agreed with the US "regime change" policy, even if there was no intelligence suggesting Iraq had WMD.
However your anti-Americanism was never questioned. dervish
Are you accusing me of being anti-American? David Hunter
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Mr Hunter -
The exchange above illustrates a large part of the problem you are having here. I say in simple unequivocal terms that I am NOT saying you are are anti-American, and you retort questioning whether I am calling you anti-American. Calm down.
This is criticism of what some, including myself, perceive as anti-US sentiment by many in the UK, but NOT YOU. Obviously as a patriot that may be hard to swallow. Nonetheless it is not directed at you personally. In fact you agree that the BBC stinks.
"The BBC are leftist, people in Britain understand this, BBC reporting is almost always biased against the Torie party."
The BBC is not consistently leftist. They are quite critical of Labour. But they are always critical of the US. As I said earlier, they are Arabist. And that colors their reporting. In fact Arabism and catering to UK's large Muslim minority colors much of the anti-US, anti-Jewish rhetoric and stances coming from the UK. Thus there were several scandals relating to anti-Semitic political ads for Labour seeking to pander to Muslim voters in the run up to the election.
"Obviously, Bush and Rove were angry that Howard had attacked Blair about the way he justified the Iraq war and they wanted to punish him."
Yes "obviously." You gloss over the "why" here. Why did Howard do that? Was it ok to undermine the war and jump on the lefty bandwagon for political gain?
While I am at it, where do you personally stand on this? Did PM Blair lie?
Howard's "Blair lied" was the mirror image, of "Bush lied" used by the left here. Further if Blair lied then so did Bush. Howard, like Kerrey, said he supported the war, after he trashed it and its origins. Howard, like Kerrey, talked out of both sides of his mouth. US Conservatives no more believe PM Blair lied than Pres Bush lied.
Further in the UK, "Neoconservative" is practically an epithet. The UK Conservatives are Buchananites.
How am I to know which posters, British or American, are 'posting under many different names'? Even if I did suspect someone was doing that then I could not prove it anyway.
Did you by any chance do all of that business in London? The sealed-off leftosphere that encloses that city makes it no more representative of the rest of the country than Manhattan is of the US.
It has hurt to see the anti-Americanism grow in England.
Most people would take: 'However your anti-Americanism was never questioned', to mean that my anti-Americanism was never in doubt. Now if you had written that my pro-Americanism was never questioned, then that would have been fine.
Yes "obviously." You gloss over the "why" here. Why did Howard do that? Was it ok to undermine the war and jump on the lefty bandwagon for political gain?
Howard wanted to win a general election, therefore, he needed an angle to attack Blair from. He always supported the war and, as I said before, he maintained throughout the election campaign that if he were PM he would have been part of the US coalition against Iraq even if he had known that there were no WMD there. (Because he agreed that Saddam was a menace and he wanted regime change). His criticism of Blair was based on the government's presentation of the intelligence data in the Iraq weapons dossier published in September, 2002. Clearly, his attack was rather opportunistic, but you could argue that it was also principled because misleading Parliament about your premise for a war is not a good thing to do in most cases. At the end of the day, Howard was trying to win an election and so exploiting chinks in his opponent's armour is what he had to do, but there was no anti-Americanism there.
While I am at it, where do you personally stand on this? Did PM Blair lie?
I have always supported the invasion of Iraq and the elimination of Saddam's regime, even in the absence of a realistic Iraqi WMD capability. However, most British people only supported the war because they had been led to believe that Saddam had a serious ongoing WMD development program and it was mainly Blair's dossier that led them to believe that. In that dossier there were extracts from Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC) advice about Saddam's WMD capability, but the caveats which had been in that advice had been removed. The dossier also claimed that Saddam 'had' chemical and biological weapons, and the foreword - signed by Blair - used the phrase 'continued to produce chemical and biological weapons'. The JIC later complained that this passage could give the impression that Saddam was actively producing such weapons when they did not know what had been produced. The Government was criticised for failing to make clear that its assessment of Saddam’s arsenal was based on limited intelligence and that its 45 minute claim was based on intelligence from only one source. Also, analysis from a student postgraduate thesis was used in the dossier and it was not attributed, so anyone would assume it had been provided by MI6 or the JIC.
Hence Blair was certainly economical with the truth and so he should not have been surprised to be called out by the opposition when the faults in this dossier came to light. However, I still believe the Iraq war was just, given Saddam's repression of his people, his belligerence towards Kuwait and Israel and his violations of numerous UN resolutions.
Most of it in Reading, just outside London.
<< First as I have repeated several times, motivation is none of your business. The articles are. Nevertheless addressing your obsession with his reasons, as I read it quidnunc said he was tired of Brit Bush bashing and would make it his business to expose this trait. And he has done so. >>
And that, insofar as quidnunc’s "british-oriented" posts are concerned is all he has ever done.
On the other hand, the parasitical personal-attack pack -- to which most of FR's universally-FReeloading, lurking, layabout, lumpem, Limey larakins have attached themselves -- relentlessly, gutlessly -- and in typical once-great-british bovver-booted bully-boy manner -- hyena-like pack-hunts and attacks any who dares call the once-great british media, politicians and unwashed masses on their overwhelming anti-Americanism.
Including and perhaps especially quidnunc.
Check your UK freeper locale lately?
The scalawags boast of their dirty deeds!
Your analysis of the WMD situation in Iraq and PM Blair's (and Pres Bush's) disclosure does not resemble the Conservative view in the US. It resembles the left. For starters, the accusation is of deliberate misleading, lying, not a case of error.
Having read the last two UN reports prior to the war, I do not feel complacent that there was no WMD threat from Iraq and that we were mistaken, let alone lied to. The absence of stockpiles does not make me secure that no threat existed.
Further digressing for a minute here, when it came to Iraq and the dearth of humint and intel from within, and there was practically none, how many sources could one realistically count on to document the 45 minute claim?
The Conservative Party did the right thing in supporting PM Blair in going to war. It is unfortunate that they could not restrain themselves from making political capital of his troubles from the left on WMD "lies," and being the US's "poodle." As I said before, the alliance of the Conservatives and Left over "Blair lied," resembles the Buchanan faction in the US.
<< Your analysis of the WMD situation in Iraq and PM Blair's (and Pres Bush's) disclosure does not resemble the Conservative view in the US. It resembles the left. >>
Hardly surprising, surely?
Given, that is, its employment in the "debate" [Read: dissemination and promulgation of dissent-provoking propaganda] by an element of the vanguard of the anti-American brigade of lumpen Limey leftist agitators who pose here as 'british "FReepers?"'
And who, as it was quidnunc's misfortune to point out, serve no purpose here -- their occasional apparent pandering to by pathetic "popularity-contest" of their own volition notwithstanding -- than to agitate and to incite and encourage envy-motivated, hatred-engined and rage-driven Euro-peon-styled dissent.
<< For starters, the accusation is of deliberate misleading, lying, not a case of error. >>
Again not surprising given that there is little to no truth to be had FRom any of the pretty-much pathologically-hesperophobic british bilge and other anti-Americanism they promulgate nor among their mob-ruled attacks upon any who -- as did quidnunc -- recognise their ratbaggery and dare to conFRont it and give it the lie!
<< [On their] 'UK "freeper"' locale ...
The scalawags boast of their dirty deeds! >>
And on and off our boards and under our very noses they and their ilk have successfully done so for at least the fourteen or fifteen years elsewhere and here at FR that I have participated in this kind of forum.
During all of that time and to date I have observed, on-and-off this forum and pre-dating it, as that parasitical pack of "scaliwags;" all the while "off-boards" incited and manipulated; be used and abused [Often, "virtually-sexually"] -- and when no longer of use be Cli'ton-esquely cast aside by its Cli'ton-cloned air-and-bandwidth-thieving leftist-agitator-posing as "conservative"-drivers, whose number, like their intellect, their manners, their tactic -- and their ability to con an American "following," remains small and small-minded -- but remains a constant!
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